"Harvey Newstrom" <mail@HarveyNewstrom.com> wrote:
> Some recent postings seem to suggest that we should sacrifice innocents to
> speed up the development of technology in the name of The Extropian
> Principals. I do not think these ideas derive from the principals at all.
> Other postings have suggested that the principals are fine for academic
> discussion, but we are at war and the principals no longer apply. If this
> is true, we need to adjust the principals. Principals are statements of
> truth for all time. They cannot just be discarded when they become
> inconvenient.
Survival counts for more than principles. Many on this list in the 'old
days' were opposed to space exploration if it meant one coerced taxpayer
penny. I see colonization of other planets as a key component of
possibly the only effective medium or long term survival strategy. For
that chance of survival I'm for coerced taxpayer support of gov't space
programs until the technology is there to allow private enterprise to
step in. Discussion of how to accomplish this otherwise (as in, entirely
within the private sector) needs (imho( to be mitigated by my belief
that we need this in the *medium* term. I can quite believe that unless
we get off this planet in less than 30-50 years it may take millions of
years to do so (as we'll all be oppressed by perfect law enforcement
technology that'll impose a theology of correct behavoir within narrow,
tightly defined bounds of what we can do or even discuss).
-Mike
-- ====================================================================== Michael Wiik Principal Messagenet Communications Research Washington DC Area Internet and WWW Consultants http://messagenet.com mwiik@messagenet.com ======================================================================
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